News for Queer Women

Gay President Of Kennedy Center Seeks $1M From Musician Who Canceled Concert After Trump’s Name Added To Building

December 31, 2025

As more artists cancel concerts after the Kennedy Center name change, Trump loyalist Richard Grenell accuses drummer Chuck Redd of staging a ‘political stunt’ – sues for lost revenue.

Featured Image: via Instagram

Festivities at the Kennedy Center are looking less festive for New Year’s Eve, as performers across a range of genres bow out. They are protesting the renaming of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, which includes the addition of Trump’s name above Kennedy’s on the building’s exterior. In response, Richard Grenell, the openly gay president of the Kennedy Center, has called the artists’ decisions a “form of derangement syndrome.” Grenell is also specifically seeking $1 million in damages from longtime jazz artist Chuck Redd who canceled his annual Christmas Eve concert after Trump’s name was added to the facade. In a letter sent December 26, 2025, Grenell accused Redd of a “political stunt” and “classic intolerance,” and informed him that the center would sue him for lost revenue and donor support.

Redd, an international percussionist and vibraphone performer, has hosted the center’s Christmas Jazz Jam since 2006. He told the Associated Press, “When I saw the name change on the Kennedy Center website and then hours later on the building, I chose to cancel our concert.”

“Regrettably, your action surrenders to the sad bullying tactics employed by certain elements on the left, who have sought to intimidate artists into boycotting performances at our national cultural center,” Grenell wrote.

Photo of Chuck Redd: courtesy of The College of William & Mary

Redd’s is not the first cancelation since Trump’s rebrand of the center. After Trump replaced the Board of the performance space (which subsequently unanimously elected him new Chair) Hamilton canceled its 2026 shows. “The Kennedy Center was meant to be for all Americans, a place where we could all come together in celebration of the arts,” Hamilton producer Jeffrey Seller wrote on X.

Citing a preference for “joy and inclusion,” Grammy Award-winning Musician folk musician Rhiannon Giddens moved her scheduled Kennedy Center show to The Anthem in D.C., writing in Threads, “I cannot in good conscience play at The Kennedy Center with the change in programming direction forced on the institution by this new board.” Actor and producer Issa Rae, rock band Low Cut Connie, and writer Louise Penny also scrapped performances. Amy Sherald, who catapulted to national consciousness with her portrait of Michelle Obama, similarly made headlines after canceling an exhibit over concerns about having her work censored.

Related: Last Call To See Amy Sherald’s Exhibit At The Whitney

Trump’s December 18th makeover of the building’s facade to “The Donald J. Trump and The John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts” comes months after the administration dumped concrete on the Jacqueline Kennedy Rose Garden lawn, prompting Jackie Kennedy’s grandson, Jack Schlossberg, to accuse Trump of trying to erase history. The addition of Trump’s name to the Kennedy Center signage has now angered additional Kennedys – understandable given that the center has stood as a living memorial solely to President Kennedy since 1964.

Kerry Kennedy is counting the days until she can pull the metal letters off that building with a pickax. Former Rep. Joe Kennedy III (D-Mass.), grandson of former U.S. Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy questioned the legality of the addition and wrote on X, “The Kennedy Center is a living memorial to a fallen president and named for President Kennedy by federal law. It can no sooner be renamed than can someone rename the Lincoln Memorial, no matter what anyone says.”

Maria Shriver, daughter of former President Kennedy’s sister, Eunice Kennedy Shriver, declared that she was “speechless, and enraged, and in a state of disbelief” (owning “TDS in full display”). Absent from the upset: the voice of President Kennedy’s nephew, HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., whose childhood chronic disease platform has become largely overshadowed by an alignment with Trump on discrimination against gender non-conforming persons; and cowardly trolling of the trans community (spearheading yet another institutional alteration – a mocking revision and deadnaming on the framed photo of former Assistant Secretary of HHS, Dr. Rachel Levine).

Related: HHS Changes Name Of Dr. Rachel Levine On Official Portrait

Like Dr. Levine, as a member of the LGBTQ community, Richard Grenell made history as a queer person appointed to a high level position in D.C. He previously served as U.S. Ambassador to Germany and Acting Director of National Intelligence (2020). While some, including the LGBTQ+ Victory Institute, had hoped that Grenell might “cash-in and use that influence to confront the administration on its anti-LGBTQ policies,” it’s clear this gay man’s devotion to Trump has literally trumped all else, including honoring the spirit of the Kennedy Center.

As of this writing, artists continue to pull out of scheduled shows. This includes the December 30th withdrawal of jazz ensemble The Cookers from “A Jazz New Year’s Eve,” who expressed regret on their website while stating that they “remain committed to playing music that reaches across divisions rather than deepening them.”

Image: Richard Grenell (right) with husband Matt Lashey (left)

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